


little heart beats so fast

by answerstobefound



Series: how to light your life on fire [2]
Category: Home Fires (UK TV)
Genre: Adultery, Canon Lesbian Character, Character Study, F/F, Fix-It
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-29
Updated: 2017-07-29
Packaged: 2018-12-08 12:43:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,833
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11646813
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/answerstobefound/pseuds/answerstobefound
Summary: Teresa knows she’s being sloppy. She knows that visiting Annie on the base as often as she does isn’t normal, even for a close friend; that she shouldn’t be inviting Annie ‘round for tea so much, or bringing her along to Alison’s or Steph’s, as she’s begun doing lately in an attempt to have a bit more time around her. She especially understands that she shouldn’t be kissing Annie between streetlamps at night, only half-protected by the early darkness of the winter months.or: Teresa Fenchurch-Lucas, confused adulteress, yearning for clarity.





	little heart beats so fast

**Author's Note:**

> so i've had this near done for about a month and was stuck on how to end it, then i had a long drive and finally got it done! i'm uploading it off the sketch wifi of my sketch hotel in london so i hope whoever monitors the hotel wifi enjoys my angsty gay fanfic. i'm on the tail end of a three week vacation in wales and i didn't open my laptop once to write and honestly? slacking off felt good but typing is so relaxing to me and getting back to that felt even better. hope y'all enjoy part two of "teresa f*cks up: the series"
> 
> you can read and understand this without having read the first part, but the first part is rlly short so like. pls read it anyway, i bet you'll like it if you like this!
> 
> also, tw for (very early, and vaguely described) miscarriage.
> 
> title from hounds of love by kate bush (which doesn't Super work for teresa but it always makes me think of her anyway for some reason)

Teresa visits Alison three times a week after school for tea, conversation, and a walk with Boris. They’ll walk for around an hour, sometimes into the village center and sometimes through the countryside, and talk about their lives the way they used to every afternoon.

 

Teresa tells Alison that married life is strange, not how she imagined them. She doesn’t want to disappoint her dearest friend. She says that sharing a bed with someone again is hard to get used to, that she rounds a corner and expects to see Alison instead of Nick. They laugh about the cooking lessons Nick gives Teresa, how mad it is, the husband having to teach the wife how to cook. She doesn’t say that she’s unhappy and that she’s been falling back into ways they both hoped she’d forget about.

 

She doesn’t say she’s been stepping out on her brand new husband with one of his good friends. One of his _decidedly female_ good friends.

 

She keeps this information to herself, holding it in the ache between her ribs when Nick grins at her while she chops vegetables for dinner on the evenings he can get away from the base, and when he kisses her forehead when he thinks she’s asleep, and especially when Teresa has her fingers or her mouth between Annie Carter’s legs.

 

* * *

 

Teresa visits Steph more and more, now that they’re both married women and Big Stan has gone back to the front, especially as winter draws in- Steph has more free time as farmlife winds now and makes sure to let Teresa know that she’s grateful for the company. Other than Alison, of all the WI, Teresa has always felt closest to Steph. The visits begin with Teresa offering books to further Steph’s reading ability. She brings a few of her favorite Agatha Christie novels to start, tells Steph to read as much as she feels like whenever she has free time, and they’ll discuss as she goes along.

 

So, Teresa visits Steph on the afternoons she isn’t with Alison, plus on the weekends when Nick spends more hours at the base than at home. They share a pot of tea and discuss the chapters Steph had read last, chat some, and sometimes take turns reading aloud.

 

Teresa isn’t afraid to tell Steph information nearer to the truth about her home life: the unease in her heart, without the specifics of the cause. How nothing feels quite right, how often she wonders if getting married was the right choice, how she can’t see what the future might possibly hold for her husband and herself. Steph listens quietly. She wraps an arm around Teresa and squeezes her shoulder when her voice shakes. When Teresa is done, Steph offers her some encouragements, like “you’ll both find your places soon enough” and “it just takes time,” but Teresa sees the way Steph looks at her. Steph suspects _something_.

 

Teresa only hopes Steph hasn’t figured out that Teresa takes the long way home to meet up with Annie for hurried, secluded kisses on the days Annie isn’t busy on the base.

 

* * *

 

Teresa knows she’s being sloppy. She knows that visiting Annie on the base as often as she does isn’t normal, even for a close friend; that she shouldn’t be inviting Annie ‘round for tea so much, or bringing her along to Alison’s or Steph’s, as she’s begun doing lately in an attempt to have a bit more time around her. She especially understands that she shouldn’t be kissing Annie between streetlamps at night, only half-protected by the early darkness of the winter months.

 

But being with a woman, even for a moment, is so intoxicating when she spends most nights under the heavy weight of her husband. The softness of Annie is heaven compared to the rough edges of Nick, who is so kind and yet so _wrong_ for her that sometimes Teresa feels like she’s turning to stone in his arms.

 

She’s being unfair to her husband, trying to lie to herself and actively lying to him, just like Annie said before the wedding and has been saying since they began their affair. The problem is that, sometimes, Teresa thinks she’s dying without Annie. She doesn’t feel anything with Nick, not when they kiss or have sex, or when she takes his arm as they walk around the village, or sitting opposite him at dinner, and Annie- just sitting beside her on Steph’s couch as they sip at too-hot tea makes the hair on her arms stand on end.

 

That’s incorrect. Teresa feels safety with Nick- safety from the potential scorn if word somehow got out that Teresa liked women and _only_ women.

 

But, with Annie, Teresa feels _everything else._

 

* * *

 

And, then, a new emotion, a kind Teresa has not felt in a very long time: deep, unadulterated fear.

 

Her time of the month is… untimely. As in, Teresa realizes in a panic when she glances at the calendar, it’s late. _Very_ late. She yanks the calendar down off the wall and flips to the previous month, thinks back to when her last period was, and finds that she’s skipped a month, already due for the next period- maybe- in a week or so.

 

Teresa suddenly feels very warm as she carefully places a hand over her flat belly.

 

She loves children, loves her students more than they’ll ever know, but Teresa came to terms a long time ago with the fact that she would never be a mother. It’s just impossible. And, in marrying Nick, Teresa had never even thought that maybe she _could_ be a mother.

 

That thought scares her more than anything has before.

 

* * *

 

She doesn’t tell Nick when he comes home for dinner that night, doesn’t tell Alison after school the next day, doesn’t tell Annie the day after that when they meet just outside the base for a few moments together.

 

As it turns out, Teresa made the right choice. One week later, she has a heavier-than-normal period, and Teresa _sobs._

 

Teresa sinks to the floor of the bathroom and cries loud, breathless tears. She cries for the lost thought of motherhood- which she wasn’t even sure she entirely wanted- and she cries in relief because, Teresa realizes, she still has an out from her marriage _._ That selfish thought sobers Teresa as soon as it passes through her mind, that a child would have bound her to Nick irrevocably. That a child would mean she could never leave him, never rip their hypothetical child’s life in half. Teresa realizes in that moment that she knows what she has to do. She knows she has to leave Nick Lucas.

 

This is the concept which sends Teresa sprinting to the Farrows’ farm.

 

Somewhere along the way, Teresa begins crying again- silent, small tears which run down her cheeks and make her even colder than normal in the early December chill. School is nearly out for holidays. Great Paxton will have a brutal winter.

 

Teresa pounds her palm on the back door until Steph appears behind her, having come from the barn-- a final nighttime check on the chickens or something similar. She wraps an arm around Teresa’s shoulders and guides her into the warm house and onto the couch. Teresa hunches over and says nothing. Accepts the hot mug of tea pressed into her cold, shaking hands by Steph. Smiles apologetically at Little Stan, who pats her shoulder and bids his mum goodnight, clearly trying to give the women privacy.

 

Steph doesn’t ask questions. She wraps a heavy blanket around Teresa shoulders before she sits beside her, wrapping an arm around Teresa’s shoulders and pulling her close. Teresa pulls her legs up onto the couch and turns her head to bury her face in Steph’s neck, carefully balancing her tea on her bent knees, and Steph still doesn’t say a word, just pulls Teresa even closer and lets her work up the courage to speak.

 

It takes eight and a half minutes of only the crackling, low fire and their combined breathing for Teresa to whisper into Steph’s floral collar, “I’m a terrible person.”

 

“Oh, come on, what’s brought this on?” Steph asks after a moment. She rubs Teresa’s shoulder with her thumb and sighs.

 

Teresa takes a deep breath and sits up to face Steph. She takes a long drink of her tea, finally, then puts it down on the floor by her feet and pulls the blanket tighter around her shoulders, protectively. She weighs her options, and decides, judgement be damned, on absolute, brutal truth. Steph probably knows anyway. And she’s not the type to hate blindly.

 

“I thought I was pregnant,” Teresa says quickly, “and I might have been but now I’m not, and I was so _relieved_ because I don’t want children with Nick. I don’t even want to _be_ with Nick. I don’t love him.”

 

“Oh, dear,” Steph takes each of Teresa’s hands in one of her own and squeezes.

 

Blood rushes up Teresa’s neck to settle in her cheeks. “I shouldn’t have married him. It was stupid to think that I-- that I could force myself to love him. He’s so kind, and he would be such a good _friend_ , but I make a terrible wife.”

 

“Teresa--”

 

“Steph, I’ve been _cheating_ on him,” Teresa spits out in a horrified whisper. It’s at times like these that Teresa doesn’t recognize herself anymore, doesn’t recognize the woman living in her skin. She feels as if she’s floating outside her own body, watching someone else make decisions, watching some other woman live out her life. As if the last few months with Nick have been a fever dream, and she’ll wake up in Alison’s spare room and everything will be back to normal.

 

Steph licks her lips, tilts her head, squeezes Teresa’s hands again. “With that woman from the base, who came ‘round? Annie?”

 

Teresa hears nothing but her own heartbeat roaring in her ears as she nods.

 

Steph pulls Teresa into a tight hug, so hard Teresa aches when Steph pulls back almost half a minute later. Steph takes Teresa’s hands again, seemingly intent on keeping some form of physical contact between them.

 

“You don’t… you never wanted to marry a _man_ , did you, Teresa?” Steph asks carefully, an almost imperceptible smile on her face. “You don’t fancy men.”

 

Teresa lets out a single, breathy laugh. “No, I don’t.”

 

Steph pats one of Teresa’s hands and smiles wider. “That’s alright, darling. That’s quite alright. Nothing wrong with that, in my mind… but you can’t keep stringing Nick along like this. Or Annie, for that matter. It’s not fair to either of them. And it’s not fair to yourself.”

 

“I know. Believe me, I know.”

 

* * *

 

Teresa turns her conversation with Steph over and over in her mind, trying to see it in a new light, but she only comes to the same conclusion every time: she has to leave Nick Lucas. Soon. Before too much damage is done.

**Author's Note:**

> I Love Steph Farrow So Much, can y'all tell? she's my BABY i might actually love her more than i love teresa. and of course she'd be lgbt friendly bc steph is the Best Ever (also she's bisexual fight me).
> 
> anyway. teresa is a lil gay mess. poor thing. all the action is gonna go down in part three, whenever i manage to actually write that. hopefully i'll get it out as quick as i did this! kudos and comments definitely help motivate me, friends :)


End file.
